


Home like the hunter, like the hare

by Acephalous



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Fix-It, M/M, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:33:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29469501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acephalous/pseuds/Acephalous
Summary: John has spent so long carefully not thinking of the future, he doesn’t know how to start again.
Relationships: John Bridgens/Henry "Harry" Peglar
Comments: 16
Kudos: 28
Collections: Bridglar Week 2021, The Terror Bingo





	Home like the hunter, like the hare

**Author's Note:**

> For my terror bingo card for the ‘didn’t realize they were injured’ square. I started writing this for 'Bridglar Week' but didn't get it done in time: just know that every week is Bridglar week in my heart.
> 
> Many thanks to isamariposa for many excellent talks about the Terror, which got me through my writer's block.

The _Enterprise_ underway is an unsettling thing. John had thought himself too seasoned a sailor to lose his sea legs, but the roll of the first real ocean swell staggers him. As he catches his balance, he realizes the ship’s movement means that the ships have slipped from the Arctic’s icy grasp, something that had seemed, until this very moment, an impossibility. He steadies himself after a moment, and continues towards sickbay. 

“Fever still hasn’t broken.” _Enterprise’s_ surgeon says, voice gruff but not unkind when he catches sight of John ducking through the door into the crowded sickbay. 

John nods to him, and seats himself beside Henry’s sickbed. He places his hand close to Henry’s, on the blanket. Henry’s not conscious, which is almost preferable to the last few times he’s woken, incoherent, and confused. He doesn’t know if Henry’s stillness is a sign of improvement, or of a further decline. He cuts the thought of Henry’s condition worsening off before he can follow it further.

Instead of dwelling on his thoughts he let’s his mind go blank, watches Henry’s chest rise and fall, and listens to the sound of his laboured breathing. It’s not a remotely peaceful pastime but it is a simple one. He’s gotten very good at this through the last days of their march, and after, during the trek to Ross’s ships. Carefully not thinking about the future, the way its possibilities seem to be shrinking more with every minute that slipped by. 

He’s not sure how long he sits there, but it’s long enough that he’s nodding off a little, and he starts when the surgeon clears his throat from behind him. 

“Go get something to eat, and some rest, Mr. Bridgens,” he says. “you’re recovering too.”

He knows from past experience that protesting that he is fine will do him little good, so he allows himself to be shepherded out the sickbay. He is, after all, very tired, in a near constant state of exhaustion. As he leaves the sickbay, he tries not to think of Henry waking without him, being lonely or afraid. 

***

The next morning John wakes, still exhausted, though his sleep was deep and dreamless. From his hammock, he listens to the sounds of the ship. He had forgotten how a ship under sail has its own living sounds: the creak of wood, the call of orders, the patter of feet across the deck. It unsettles him: he keeps listening for the groaning and grinding of ice against the hull. 

It’s early but sleep is a lost cause, so rises from his hammock and finds a quiet corner to try to read. Before he opens the book he runs his fingers over the lettering on the cover. It’s a book he’s read many times before, and when he had borrowed it form _Enterprise’s_ library it had been a bit like seeing the face of an old friend. He’s read it many times before and had thought it would be comforting to re-read, but now the words on the page fail to hold his attention, or speak to him in any way. He flicks through the pages, trying to find something to keep his attention. But none of it, not story of the great powers colliding, not the war, nor the plague, nor the account of suffering or of great bravery sticks in his mind. It all seems very pointless, both the effort it would have taken to write this down, and his own effort now, to read the words. He can’t quite grasp what he would have found worthwhile about it in the past.

He tucks the book under his arm, and returns to the sickbay. He sits by Henry’s bedside, reopens the book and, in a low murmur, so as not to disturb the other sick men, begins to read. The thought that it might be easier to read here, to read to Henry even if he isn’t awake, fades quickly. He still can’t take in the words on the page, keeps losing his place and re-reading the same sentence again, or skipping ahead too far, and gradually he lets his voice subside into silence. 

He puts the book on the bedside table, carefully marking his page, as though he had any idea what he had been reading, as though he has any interest in picking up the book again. He goes back to watching Henry. Is he breathing a little easier or with more struggle? Impossible to tell: one minute he thinks the later, the next, with desperate hope, the second. It’s exhausting, and so he tries to quiet his mind again, exist only in this moment, now. He checks he is unobserved, then brushes the hair back from Henry’s face.

***

Later, after he’s gently chased from Henry’s side again, he makes his way to the mess for the evening meal. Heads turn, as he passes, _Enterprise_ men watching. He cannot blame Ross’s men for the pity in their eyes, the way healthy men look at the very ill. He can’t blame them for not being able to forget the desperate state they had been in, as they staggered towards Fury Beach, more dead than alive. The gulf of suffering between the crews seems far too large to be surmounted. 

There are a few other Franklin men in the mess as well, a cluster of men around Tom Hartnell, but he avoids their eye, and sits by himself. He would have more understanding from them, but there’s always a gap between the sailors and a steward, something that being at sea has reminded him of. The only times he had not noticed the divide was the march, where misery had ground any such differences to nothing, and times when he and Henry had sailed together, for Henry had a way of making friends, quick and easy. John cuts his thoughts off before it becomes too painful. Another reason to sit alone: if he has to field a single question about Henry’s wellbeing, he thinks he might shatter. 

As he eats, he tries to ignore how stifling and close belowdecks feels, his deep and pervasive sense of unease, which he cannot seem to shake. Across the mess he catches sight of one of the sailors, laughing with his mates as he scrapes uneaten food off his plate, and the sight of the waste is too much for him. He is on his feet, and out of the mess, and up the ladder and on the deck almost before he realizes it. He leans against the rail trying to catch his breath with the burn of the cold in his lungs, watches the water slipping by. Ice on the waves, and the wind in the sail, and none of it peaceful, though he would have found it peaceful, once. He’s aware as he straightens a bit of being watched by the sailors on deck, with idle interest and a hint of concern. It is unbearable, and he’s torn between returning to the claustrophobia below decks, or staying here in the cold. Eventually the cold drives him back belowdecks, and he shivers for a long time in his hammock, before sleep finds him.

***

The next morning, he makes his way to the sickbay again, a dull and miserable routine. But today, when the surgeon sees John, he smiles, and nods his head towards Henry’s cot. Despite the man’s expression John feels a great spike of dread in his chest, as though any change can only be for the worse. But the fear is unfounded, for Henry is awake. He blinks up at John and then smiles, eyes bright and lucid. 

“John.” He says, voice weak but audible, and John, legs gone weak, manages to direct his collapse mostly into the chair by the cot.

John grabs Henry’s hand in both of his, curls forward until his forehead rests against their joined hands, too overcome for a long moment to speak. Henry runs his thumb gently along the back of John’s hand. 

John lifts his head. “I was worried.” Tilts his gaze back at the rest of the sickbay, can’t find any words that don’t carry too much risk to be said here, so he repeats, “I was worried.” Henry squeezes his hand.

“I’m not sure how much you remember.” John continues, “We’re on the _Enterprise_ …”

“I know,” Henry says, “The surgeon explained when I woke.”

John winces, feels a flood of guilt. “I’m sorry, I should have been here when you woke. I meant to be. I hope you weren’t worried.”

Henry’s thumb keeps moving gently over the back of John’s hand. “I didn’t worry,” his eyes go towards the book on the table by the bed. “I knew you were about.” He’s smiling still. 

John helpless before the sudden surge of emotion this brings, loved and in love, can only smile back. The fierce joy in his chest feels fragile beyond measure: look at it too closely and it might shatter to pieces. 

***

Henry regains his health in leaps and bounds: a testament to the wonders adequate food and medical attention can bring about. It’s not long before Henry is leaving the sick bay, John offering him his arm to help support him. Henry hardly needs the assistance, but he leans into John anyway, solid, and warm, and alive.

With Henry in his way to recovery, John tries the book again. But when he begins to read out loud he still seems to lack the wit for it. Part way through his stumbling attempt to follow the words, Henry gently pulls the book from his hands. Leans over the open page starts to read out loud himself. 

John watches him, the fall of his hair, the slope of his shoulders, the sound of his voice and still can’t attend the words. His mind keeps offering flashes of worse moments, until the present feels unreal and strange. Henry notices his slipping attention, stops reading, looks at him kindly. 

“Never thought I’d see the day when you found Thucydides dull,” he says, “at least when we’re back in England we’ll have more choices. What’s the first thing you want to read?”

John, smiles at him, tries to find an answer, but he can’t quite picture being back on shore. They would rent a set of rooms, he knows, as they’ve done in the past after a voyage. He knows the kind of room, the way the rain would fall on the narrow window, the way the little room would feel spacious after shipboard life. He can picture it, down to the pile of books, and the light of the fire. But in his mind’s eye the room sits empty, no matter how he tries to imagine the two of them there. John has spent so long carefully not thinking of the future, he doesn’t know how to start again. 

“I don’t know.” John admits into the silence that’s sprang up between them. “I haven’t been thinking much of what comes next.”

Henry leans sideways a little to knock his shoulder against John’s. 

“I think I’d like a book with a bit of action in it. Maybe I’d find a copy of that new adventure story: The Three Musketeers. I wanted to read it before we sailed, you remember. Just never got around to it.”

John nods. He can picture it now: Henry in it bent over his book, that focused furrow in his brow he gets when he’s caught up in reading. Still can’t quite picture himself in the scene. 

***

John feels his old health returning to him, feeling the exhaustion and aches and pains that he had come to accept as normal fade more each day. It’s a strange feeling, realizing he had been unwell only by its contrast to his returning health. But for all that his physical health is improving his mind won’t quite settle, keeps shifting away from any thought of the future, like he’d spent so long cutting off any thought of what was coming that he’s lost the knack for it.

He doesn’t fret about it as much as he might though, with Henry near. In the night, when the dark should press in and magnify his worries, their hammocks are side by side. He can hear Henry’s breathing in the dark, amongst all the other sounds in the night, and know that Henry is close and safe. It’s not such a terrible present for all he still can’t quite imagine the future that comes after it. 

Henry must know he’s uneasy, but Henry has a patient way about him when its needed: can wait out John as he works through his thoughts. And still he keeps asking those small questions about what comes next when they reach England, variations on the same theme of what the future will hold. 

“What shall we eat when we’re back on shore?” He asks casually, one day. The next day he asks: “Shall we find lodgings in London or somewhere else?”

He seems content enough when John has no answer for him, and answers his own questions when there is nothing forthcoming from John. 

“I think I want eggs first, or a piece of beef that hasn’t seen the inside of a can,” he says, and “We’ll lodge in London I think. You like London.” 

And John thinks of Henry, bent over a plate of food, or hurrying through the London rain, and still can’t imagine himself there. 

***

As more days pass, the ship gradually begins to feel less strange to John, he stops expecting the corpse-like stillness of _Erebus_ locked in place, and the roll of _Enterprise_ feels natural and right. Henry keeps up his questions about the future, and his answers to himself with more and more elaborate answers every time John doesn’t have anything to say. 

“Where shall we find lodgings? In London?” He asks, as they lean together over the copy of Thucydides that John is starting to have the attention for again. John looks up at him, and has no answer. 

“I was thinking of that room we rented in ‘44. you remember the one, that widow ran the place. I liked it there. It was quiet.” 

He gives John a speaking look, because private is what he means when he says it was quiet, a garret room with no walls shared with a neighbour, and only the deaf old woman below. John smiles. Can’t see himself there though. Henry bounding up the stairs. Henry at the window looking at the people passing below, Henry with a book by the fire. The scene Henry describes still feels like a fantasy. He’s read stories fairy stories that seemed more real to him.

The other sailors are talking of the future too. Their fellow Franklin men excited about the prospect of returning home, and the _Enterprise_ men glad at the thought of the end of a long journey. And always John can only give him the same answer when someone asks what comes next: “I don’t know.” 

***

On deck John stares at the open ocean. The weather is almost warm and there’s a tern wheeling, high in the sky. The ship feels alive and so does he. He goes below decks with a smile on his face, and as he comes into the mess he hears Henry’s laugh. He’s bent over a game of dice with some of the _Enterprise’s_ crew, quick and friendly as always, but he looks up unerringly as though he knew John would be there, his smile getting a little wider when he sees John. And John has a feeling in his chest that he doesn’t recognize for a long moment, and then all at once he does: joy. This moment feels real, and true, and good.

When John makes his way over Henry says: “We were just talking about the first thing we would do when we got back to England.” 

Henry seems to expect John’s silence, continues casually, “I was telling them what I’d do. After I got lodgings settled, I’d sleep in, eat a solid lunch, then I’d go sit by the river, and after I’d head to buy a new book or two,”

And John can see it in his mind: the little street, Henry with John at his side. The weather would be cloudy but warm. They’d bend over the books together, discussing what to read, then sit and watch the ships on the water, leaf through the books they’ve bought. He can see himself there in the moment, believes in such a future moment could exist, wants to reach for the future, unafraid. 

He says, almost without thinking, “Should buy the books first, you’ll want to sit by the river and read.” 

Henry looks at him, grinning. “Good advice. Books first then.”

***

When the first hint of the English shore clouds the horizon, the Franklin men gather on the deck, silent and staring. Henry stands beside John, and John taking a deep breath, the awareness of the upcoming change from the liminal space of the ship, into whatever the future holds. Soon they will return to the bustle and the hectic rush of England, life carrying on. Possibilities opening back up, branching and branching away from each passing moment. But for now, there is another moment to breathe and prepare. The calm before coming home.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from ‘The Homecoming’ by Barbara Howes
> 
> I’m fudging the English translation date of “The Three Musketeers” by a few years.


End file.
